I Lost The Memories But I Found You
by Thousandsmiles
Summary: Inspired by a tumblr post where Jason loses his memory after the pit, somehow ends back up in Gotham and starts working for W. E. Bruce passes him in the copier room one day and completely freaks out.


This is inspired by a tumblr post...that I actually found on Pinterest...

Trigger warnings for mentions of death, depression and suicidal thoughts.

Anyway I hope you all enjoy...

Disclaimer : I do not own Batman.

* * *

"Congratulations Mr... Doe," the HR rep said, quickly correcting her fallen smile. She handed him a stack of papers and an envelope.

Dave Doe, took them from her with a charming smile. "Thanks…," he leaned over to see her ID," Ms Cheryl. "

He was gratified to see her blush. Still got that at least. You know out of everything else he doesn't. Damn, amnesia is annoying.

It's especially annoying when all the things you keep finding out about yourself are kinda, sorta, maybe alarming. Like the scars, and the reflexes and the ability to make fake documents that pass official scrutiny. Not that he was ungrateful for the last two. As far as he could tell his reflexes had probably kept him alive enough for the monks to find him and the documents were the only reason he'd gotten back to America; his accent then being the only clue as to where he'd come from.

It had been a fluke, a random coincidence that had led him to Gotham. He'd knocked into someone at the airport and despite his apologies, the man had snarled something about Gothamites all being the same and stalked off.

But the strangest thing, the thing that really worried him was that there were no records of Dave from before whatever had happened five years ago.

Facial recognition came up with nothing. There was nothing in missing persons. Now Dave knew that facial recognition wasn't accurate when it came to matching adult to child faces but none of the possible matches Dave had gotten even looked like him. He'd even once gotten the picture of a burrito. No. Someone was actively blocking the search. Dave had stopped trying for fear of attracting attention he didn't want. Maybe he should have chosen his new name as Jason Bourne. It might have been more appropriate. And on the plus side, no one would have believed it was real! Not that it wasn't but nobody could prove otherwise either which would give Dave some small but much-needed amusement.

Not that Dave Doe was exactly normal. But he really couldn't resist the pun. So sue him. Or hit him over the head with a crowbar.

But Dave wasn't the sort of person to give up which was why he was here, in Gotham, despite the fact that there might be people who were detrimental to his health here. Oh and the supervillain attacks every week. No really, Dave was seriously thinking about investing in a gas mask. Luckily Wayne Enterprises gave their new hires a small advance on their first salary, anticipating that most new hires were struggling to make ends meet. If Dave stretched that advance he might be able to squeeze in a gas mask. Maybe. Possibly a set of ice skates? That ice guy, what was his name again Mr. Ice? Freeze Man? Froster? No, no, Mr. Freeze, that was it. Yeah, he seemed to be particularly active right now. And the Happy Feet dude who always made Dave feel like he had a head cold every time he spoke.

Man, Gotham had too many villains. And they were freaking weird too. Maybe it wasn't so strange, the number of scars he had. Maybe that amount of scarring was typical for the average gothamite. Maybe that's why he knew martial arts too. Hell he wouldn't even be surprised. Gotham was the a-hole of the armpit of America. It was where filth went to die but never managed it. The sweltering scum of constipation.

Maybe Dave should have stayed in India. The monks wouldn't have minded. Too much. He didn't really need to find himself that much did he? And really, Dave can't exactly imagine that he left behind a great life behind. He can see Ajie giving him a gentle head shake and feel him pressing his hand to his chest, hear him saying, "It will haunt you like all unfinished things do. You cannot hide from who you are forever and you are too stubborn to let go of the boy you were and you are too uncertain of the man you are now. The past molds us, defines us but does not control us. Do not be afraid of what you might find. Do not be ignorant of it. For how can we learn from the past if we do not know it?"

Dave lets out a harsh breath. Well for better or for worse he was in Gotham and he'd just gotten hired as a corporate administrative assistant for the mega-company Wayne enterprises. With a bit of luck and a decent salary Dave might just be able to hunt down his past.

Who knows? Maybe he'll even run into it headfirst. It won't surprise him in the slightest because clearly, the universe loves to screw him over.

* * *

The first three weeks of his job was boring. Well, not boring exactly but rather completely normal. He learnt his duties pretty quickly, used his natural charm to make friends, made jokes about his name, laughed at jokes people made about his name, faked a backstory, freaked himself out a little about how good he was at lying, checked out a couple of dojo's, almost burnt down his kitchen trying to cook ramen but somehow made gourmet waffles, oh, and joined his co-workers in bird and bat-watching.

Apparently, gothamites were obsessed about their own vigilante. Like all celebrities, there were people who hated the bat, loved him, tolerated him, thought he was freaking weird (Dave was one of those), liked Robin but hated Batman, hated Robin but liked Batman, drooled over Nightwing's totally enviable butt (dammit there was no way Dave's butt was ever going to look like he had to be happy with his thighs. Still some people have all the luck), tried to match Batman's butt to various people (how did they even get a picture, the guys cape covers it all the time. Damn the paparazzi in this place was crazy), and tweeted various encounters they had with Batman or other villains.

Dave was starting to become more convinced that his scars were perfectly normal among Gothamn's crowd. Gothamites, Dave was slowly starting to realize, were all insane. They acted normal but really, secretly, they were insane. And the worse part? The worst part was that Dave fit in with them like he'd never left, like he belonged there, like Gotham was tattooed into his bones, lodged in his marrow, mapped out in his nerves, exhaled with every breath and drawn in on every inhalation.

If there was any doubt that Gotham was his home, it was wiped away in the first few weeks he'd spent in the city. He was home here. And somewhere in this festering cesspool of good and bad and everything in between, was what was left of his life, the clue to his past, the remnants of who he'd been.

If only he could find those damn clues!

* * *

Bruce Wayne was wandering through WE corridors making small talk with his department heads, interrupting workflows, causing interns to swoon and generally being the much-tolerated nuisance associated with Brucie Wayne, playboy billionaire, and mostly-absent CEO.

It was difficult. It had never been pleasant to play Brucie but ever since...him, it had been downright difficult. Of course, after it had first happened he hadn't had to play Brucie. People gave him space, understood when he wasn't as gregarious as he'd been before but eventually as time passed he'd been forced to slowly resume his role no matter how much he felt like tearing open his own chest sometimes.

Jason was a wound that wouldn't ever stop bleeding. He was a wound that Bruce wouldn't let stop bleeding because he didn't deserve for it to heal. Jason deserved to be remembered. He was worth every iota of pain his memory and Bruce's failure wrought.

Tim...Tim helped. His newest Robin was the only reason that Bruce wasn't actively carving that jagged wound in his chest wider. Tim didn't deserve that. Bruce wouldn't fail another Robin. He wouldn't fail another lost, lonely boy, who was so, so brilliant. And so aching selfless. Tim deserved better than Bruce. Bruce couldn't give him better, couldn't convince him to find someone better, so the least he could do was try, try and hold on no matter how much the aching pain of losing Jason lanced through his bones every day.

Bruce flirted with a secretary in the admin floor and then walked down the corridor glancing into rooms as he passed by.

Then he walked past the copier room and his heart dropped down into his shoes. His lungs seized and Bruce froze. Because, because that couldn't be.

He was older yes, broader, his frame filled out, taller than Bruce almost, face more angular but Bruce knew him. Would know him anywhere, no matter how long it had been.

Jason.

His next thought was that how cruel his hallucination must be to give him this aged up, healthy version of his boy when the last time Bruce had seen him, he was, he was barely there.

Then the hallucination moved. He efficiently slapped another piece of paper on the glass of the scanner/copier and hit the button.

Bruce blinked. The hallucination was still there. In fact, it had a W.E. badge clipped onto one pocket and the shirt he wore had W.E's logo.

The page was slipped from the glass and another joined it before Bruce could make his feet move.

He opened his mouth to say something but all that came out was a weird croak.

The hallucination looked up and frowned at him.

Bruce tried and failed to speak again.

"Uh, are you okay?" and it couldn't be a hallucination. It couldn't be. Not with that deep, rusty voice, a sheer echo of the voice that had just been beginning to crack when he died. And yet. Yet it had to be.

"What are you?" Bruce managed and that was so not what he wanted to say.

"Uh, one of the new admin staff," Jason said still frowning at him and he didn't remember. He didn't remember. He was staring at Bruce like he hadn't seen him in his life. Like he'd never been his son. Was this some sort of pseudo-reincarnation?

"No, " Bruce shook his head. "What are you!? Are you a clone? Some sort of meta.?" He strode forward and gripped the person by their shoulders. Definitely not a hallucination. Too solid, warm, real. "What are you doing here?"

The person ripped themselves away from Bruce looking at him like he was insane. And he must have appeared to be so. He reached out again and squished the face of the person. It didn't deform like rubber, no cosmetics smeared. It felt like skin.

The badge on the Jason-thing said Dave. Dave-Jason made an angry muffled sound and pulled away once more from Bruce.

"I was doing some scanning! " Dave-Jason yelped. He was backing away from Bruce slowly even as Bruce advanced almost subconsciously.

"Who are you?"

"Dave," the frazzled employee said. He angled his body in a motion that was familiar. Bruce had taught him that stance. He'd spent ages getting it right with the boy. The boy who now flowed into it easily, effortlessly.

Jason.

He stared at Bruce wildly for a second as Bruce drew closer to him and then continued to inch backward.

After a moment though he dashed around him and to the door yelling over his shoulder, "I was doing some scanning! It's not a crime! I'm late for a meeting!"

Bruce blinked as Jason practically vanished into thin air. He tried desperately to shuffle his thoughts into some sort of coherent order but the only thing that came up was:

'That was a lie. The admin staff didn't have meetings, they had memo wars.'

Jason

What?

Bruce leaned against the scanner trying to steady himself and accidentally scanned his hand. He cursed and hurriedly set about erasing his handprint from the system.

* * *

Scanning. That was it. That was all he was doing. Innocently scanning some reports into the system and then… a wild boss appears. Wild and utterly freaking insane. Dave knew his boss was supposed to be something of an air. Gotham's darling playboy CEO who had his underling keep his company afloat but he didn't know he was psycho!

Seriously who assaults their employees, and pinches their cheeks? Should he report this to HR? Did this count as assault? Is he allowed to report on his boss?

What the hell had happened?

"Frickity frack," Dave muttered.

Should he report that his boss had a mild psychotic breakdown? Maybe he should. He can't let the possibly-having-a-mental-breakdown boss wandering around, attacking other poor employees. For one, not everyone can defend themselves like Jason, and two, he didn't think even airhead Wayne wanted his metal problems to be blown far and wide on the company gossip's vine.

Mind made up, Dave headed to HR.

* * *

"Dick."

"Bruce? " the voice on the other end was sober, no hint of teasing. He must have heard how close to breaking Bruce was.

"W.E," he says in lieu of anything else. He can't imagine saying anything about this over the phone.

"I'll be there in twenty," Dick says and then he's gone. Bruce has no doubt he'll be gunning down the road on his bike at incredibly unsafe speeds. He doesn't care. He needs him here, needs his grounding presence, the soft, easy way in which Dick lights up his world even when he's tearing apart all his plans and telling him he's an idiot. He needs someone that knows Jason. He can't do this to Alfred. Not yet.

Tim, Tim might be able to help but he rather suspected that the younger boy would focus on him, not Jason, wondering if this had or would push him over the edge. It is a Robin's job to worry about Batman after all, no matter how much he tries to white it out from their job description.

* * *

He's standing by the windows staring out at Gotham when Dick slides into his office. His oldest pauses and then slips up next to him.

"What is it, Bruce?"

Bruce swallows hard and then says, "I saw Jason today."

Dicks body realigns itself subtly. He worried in a different way now.

"Bruce," he starts.

"I'm not hallucinating, Bruce says firmly." I saw him and he's older and he doesn't know me. "

"B," Dick tries again.

"He's working here, " Bruce cuts him off. He spins on his heel and strides over to his computer. "Look, employee records."

Dick walks over and studies the images and Bruce half hopes Dick will say he's not seeing it, that it's a completely different person on the screen and Bruce's mind has finally cracked from grief. The other half of him hopes that Dick sees what he does, that it's Jason, that there's a miracle walking around the floors of his building.

He is entirely unprepared for Dick's hand to fly out and push him hard. Bruce stumbles to the side and Dick uses the space cleared, to grab Bruce's office chair and drag it to him before collapsing into it heavily.

"Bruce?" his voice is cracking, face ashen. "Bruce, what the hell?" He stares at the picture on the screen and then blinks hard, closes his eyes, swallows heavily.

"Is this some sort of trick? A clone? An android? I mean it has to be right?"

His voice is pleading.

Dick and Jay hadn't gotten off on the right foot but Dick had loved the boy who'd become his younger brother, had been as shattered as Bruce at the funeral, moving in the same sort of fugue state. Trying and failing to comprehend reality.

"I, I don't know," Bruce admitted. "I couldn't. I needed…"

And Dick understood. Understood Bruce's halting words and trailing silences Like he'd done so many times in his life.

He scrubbed his hands over his face briefly and then frowned at the photo. "Wait did you say he doesn't remember anything?"

"That is correct, " Bruce said.

"So what name does he go by now? "

"Dave,"

Dick gave a horrified gasp. "Dave-bird! "

Bruce sputtered. "Dick!"

His eldest grinned back at him and Bruce as usual was blown away by his resilience.

"So operation investigate Dave-bird is a go? "

Bruce sighed and pinched his forehead.

A knock startled both of them. Bruce looked up and frowned upon seeing his HR manager. He waved them in.

"Jill," he said jovially "What can I do for you today?"

"Well," Jill shifted a little uncomfortable," it is a delicate situation Mr. Wayne," she began.

Bruce gestured for her to continue looking blankly confused.

With a darting glance at Dick, Jill soldered on. "There's uh, been a harassment complaint against you by a male member of staff? He uh, claims you, uh, cornered him in the copier room and thinks you might have been feeling unwell?"

Anything Bruce would have said in response was drowned out by Dick's peal of laughter.

* * *

Bruce and Dick were acting weird. Not that this was exactly unusual but for once Tim couldn't pinpoint the why for their behavior. And for once, they both were, not unfocused but not detached the way they usually did when there was a case.

Oh, and they very carefully weren't telling Tim a thing. Which obviously meant that Tim should do some detective work on his own. After all, Bruce had a history of stupid and Dick had a history of egging that stupid on. He loved them, he did, more than he should, more than he was allowed, but sometimes Tim had to admit that they were sometimes the two most ridiculous idiots on the planet. He was secretly sure Alfred counted him as the third idiot on his own personal list. Eh, Tim can live with that.

It takes him a bit to figure out because Bruce is great and programming and Dick is better. But Tim is the best, (barring Oracle, she is a goddess whose ground shall not be trod on) so it really only takes him about 5 hours of dedicated hacking while his history homework moans on the table next to him, singing dirges of neglect.

That's when he gets a name. A freaking name and nothing else. There's plane records that go nowhere and a W.E. employment dossier but that's it. Which means it's time to hack W.E's internal servers and find out just what it really is that Bruce and Dick are hiding.

* * *

"You should talk to him," Bruce says and it's probably the most distressed he's sounded in years.

Dick laughs at him. "Scared you'll get written up for harassment old man?"

Bruce glares and Dicks smirk only grows wider. But it vanishes in a second.

"Bruce I love Jay, I did, but we didn't get along until the end. You were the one who spent the most time with him. You were the one that had the biggest impact on his life. You're the one he'll remember the best. I know he didn't before but if we wanna try jogging his memory then you're the one that has to try. "

Bruce closes his eyes. Wishes for a brief moment that he didn't raise such a logical child and then laughs internally at himself because he did raise a logical child but there was no way in hell he raised a kid as in tune with emotions as Dick. No that was Dick all on his own with a little Babs thrown in.

"Alright," he sighs, "Alright."

Dicks smiles and then it turns into a smirk, "Remember now, don't come off as stranger danger!" The smirk turned to a pained gasp as Bruce connected the tip of his shoes to Dick's shin

* * *

All day. Scratch that. For the last three days, ever since his very odd and slightly distressing encounter with Bruce Wayne, Jason had been feeling eyes on his back. At first he'd put it down to office gossip getting around about what happened in the copier room. But it wasn't. None of his co-workers were paying any more attention to him than usual. No, it was something else and that made Jason uneasy.

Had his previous life in Gotham caught up with him? Was he about to be killed, arrested, reinducted into a cult? Forced to pay child support? Literally anything was possible.

On the fourth day Dave was literally contemplating starting a post-it note battle with the nearest office building (Lex Corp eww) so he could cover up the windows.

Naturally, that was the day when a kid rolled through his window of the fortieth floor at five in the evening and tucked himself underneath Dave's cubicle.

Dave for all that he'd heard the many stories in Gotham, certainly had not expected this. He blinked, looked around to find that most of his co-workers had disappeared for the day and then looked back down at the kid. Yep still there. Still wearing garishly bright colours. Still wearing a domino mask that for some reason made it difficult to figure out what he looked like without it. And… Dave's brain clicked. Yep, Robin, like in Batman and Robin, was still underneath his cubicle desk staring up at him.

Dave opened his mouth but Robin beat him to it.

"Is anyone out there?"

"Uh," Dave glance around to find that all of his co-workers had finally left. "Nope."

"Great," Robin said uncurling himself, "or this would have been awkward."

"It's not? " Dave said trying not freak out visibly when it became apparent how small Robin was. He knew Robin was a kid but it didn't really hit you until said kid was standing in front of you looking all too tiny for the way he spoke and too damned short.

"Well awkwarder," Robin said and gave him a blinding smirk. Something in Dave's brain twitched at it. He forgot all about it when Robin approached. The kid moved smoothly. There was a still a spring in his step, garish costume swaying but each movement he made was quiet and assured. He stepped like a cat on the prowl and Dave tensed automatically. Robin noticed but didn't stop. He came straight up to Dave, and stared deeply at him to the point where Dave asked, "Uh are you into older guys or something?"

Robin's startled look was everything before his nose wrinkled in disgust.

"Ugh no! And if I were you wouldn't have made the cut anyway!"

"Ouch!" Dave said torn between being amused and being offended. "So what's up with the staring?"

"I was trying to figure out if it was true," Robin replied. "And, and I think it is."

"Figure out what? What's true?"

"Who you are," Robin said calmly. "You're Jason Todd."

"I didn't want to believe it," Robin continued, " I mean it's utterly crazy right? But you're here. You're you. You don't show up as anything other than human on the scans so it has to be you."

Years of searching and the answers were simply given to him. Robin looked up at him expectantly and Dave no Jason it was Jason now wasn't it?...didn't know how to feel. He should be grateful, he should be happy, he should be asking questions, verifying his information but the only thing that swelled up in him was anger.

It's been months, months since the edges of his vision were tinged with green but the anger hit him hard and fast and he was moving before he even knew he was.

He had Robin slammed up against the glass wall in seconds, the kid's lenses wide with surprise, gloved hand grasping at his hand.

"Yeah?" Jason said. "Yeah, you know me? You think I'm the real deal? You know who I am and what happened to me?"

"Yes?" Robin choked out. He looked confused but he wasn't actively attacking, not actively trying to break free. Dave...Jason registered that on some level but it was buried far,far in the back of his mind. The anger doubled, tripled.

"Then where the frickin' frack were you?!" He roared. "Huh? Where was all those people who knew me? Where were they all these years when I was lost and trying to find my way back here?!" He pulled back Robin and slammed him against the wall. "Why, if you're so eager to find me, did you block my searches?!"

"We didn't!" Robin started.

Dave...Jason, it was Jason, turned and flung him across the room. The kid arched in midair, turned his flight into something controlled, landed on his feet in light controlled movements.

"Jason we weren't trying to hide from you," he said.

"Bullshit!" Jason snapped. There was a pen in his hand, he didn't know when he'd grabbed it but he knew how to use it. He advanced, anger that he hadn't even known he'd been harbouring built up and poured out of him.

Robin backed away, looking cool and calm now, muscles tensed for a fight. "Jason…" he said, "Jason ...do you even know who Jason Todd is?"

"What does it matter?!" Jason snarled.

Robin almost rolled his eyes. The kid's easy manner, almost unconcern riled him. "Or course it matters you amnesic troglodyte! It matters because you're the son of one of the richest men in Gotham and your death was one of the hottest stories. The reporters well, they went digging for everything, anything they could find to make a scandal. They dug without a single damn respect for the dead or the grieving until we simply blocked them. We weren't trying to hide from you. We were trying to get some privacy from the world. Trying to grant you privacy from the vultures."

Jason stopped advancing. "What?" He swallowed, blinked, tried to make sense of it all. "What?"

The green in head was maiking hard to think.

"We thought you were dead," Robin said softly. "If we'd known ...gosh Jason...if we'd known we'd never have stopped scouring the world for you."

He stepped forward and Jason flung an arm up, halting him.

"Don't," he said voice harsh and rough. There was green and a howling madness in his head. The monks had helped, they had, but there'd been blood, so much blood in those early months, years. He couldn't...shouldn't….

He hissed and dropped in a crouch one hand splayed on the ground, the other gripping the pen hard enough that it creaked.

"Jason?" Robin asked and his voice was all business now.

"Don't," Jason gritted out. He made the mistake of glancing up at the kid. The green of the costume popped out at him, mixing with the green that bubbled on the edges of his vision and an unexplained nostalgia, the feeling of flight and bloody mouths and magic. There was a moment of silence and then a soft intake of breath.

"Oh," Robin said. He twitched his darker cape over the green portions of his costume and Jason breathed easier. After a hesitant moment, Robin sat down on the ground across from him, legs crossed, draped in his cloak like a masked burrito.

He waited patiently as Jason fought the rage,the madness, the need to spill blood, to wipe the green out with red.

After a few long minutes Jason exhales a shaky breath and shifted into a cross-legged position moving like his bones ached.

"Do you know," he said voice rasping, "That you have no self-preservation instincts?"

Robin snorted. "I throw myself at criminals at night, punch them in the face and pun," the kid said, "Which part of that made you think I have self-preservation instincts?"

His flippant reply started a laugh out of Jason.

"Fair enough," he says chuckling. "Okay so...clear up some things for me will you? Like how the hell do you know me? And how am I the son of the richest man in Gotham? And do those two things intersect?"

"Well," Robin said, "To be perfectly fair I never really met your before. I'm after your time. But you were adopted by Bruce Wayne."

Jason choked. "What?!"

"Bruce Wyane?" Robin says, "Head of Wayne Enterprises? The guy you're ironically working for right now?"

"Oh my gosh!" Jason said faint with horror. "Jiminy cricket! Leaping lizards! Rocky road to the mint chocolate chip! Pistachio on a cracker!" He dropped his head in his hands. "That's why he freaked out!" He lifted his head and stared at Robin wild-eyed. "I sicced HR on him for harassment!"

Robin blinked, lens clicking. "You…." he trailed off and after a pause his shoulders started shaking with laughter. He clapped a hand over his mouth but couldn't quite muffle the peals of laughter. "That's the best thing I've ever heard!"

"You need to hear better things!" Jason snapped and then cradled his head in his hands. "My life in a disaster. How does this happen? How did no one else recognize me?!"

"You actually look pretty different," Robin managed through his laughter. "But yeah, this was one hell of a coincidence."

Jason takes a few moments to stare blankly at the floor because everything was a mess and he didn't know okay?

"Okay," he says slowly. "Okay you've explained the rich man son thing, now explain how you know me. Or sorta know me," he added frowning.

At that Robin's mirth died. He sat up a little, peaked around to ensure they really were alone and then ducked back down and looked at Jason intently.

"I sort of know you because...well...because you were Robin, Jason. You were the Robin before me."

* * *

Jason froze. He crashed. Drowned in verdant pain. In cracking bones. In heat too much to bear. In flight. In a spot of light in foggy skies. In laughter and wild movement. In magic. In wonder. In solid blackness at his back. In the scent of smoke. In needles in arms and a face dying slowing in front of him. In small apartments drowning in smog.

He drowned in rare smiles and british accents. In large halls. In a library too big to be believed. Pressed between the pages of books he didn't remember.

He drowned for long,agonizing moment and then a breath forced itself down his throat and he was surfacing and everything was lost, as sunlight hit his face.

"What," he choked out. Because, because what? "How?" "I….." "How does this happen? How does…?"

It takes his stressed brain too long to fit the pieces together. Too long but he does it. Slowly slotting the mystery of his life, of his scars and reflexes and his wide and varied knowledge together.

"Oh my gosh," he says. He stares at Robin. At..at his replacement. "Bruce Wayne is,"

Robin nods sharply cutting him off.

"I, I was…"

"Yes," Robin says.

Jason leans back on his hands and stares at the kind in front of him. "Me," he says because he kinda can't believe it.

"Yep," Robin says and his voice is soft. It rubs Jason the wrong way. He feels the anger build, forces it down then realises something else, something from the office gossip.

"Wait a minute, he said, "You've been Robin for four years. I disappeared five years ago."

He sits up abruptly. "He didn't….he didn't even wait a year before he replaced me didn't he? Not if he had to train you!" The anger he'd pushed down only a few seconds before flares up.

"He, he replaced me! He replaced me like I was nothing!"

"What?!" says Robin startled. "Jason no!"

"All that shit about never stopping scouring the world for me? All that's utter bullshit isn't it?" Jason jumped to his feet striding back and forth between the cubicles. "He didn't care for me!" He doesn't know why it was those words that tore themselves out of his throat but they did and he hurt, inside, something ached. Something like a scent that you'd never have again, a memory lost so much that all you knew was that you'd lost something but no idea what. "He up and replaced me as soon as he got a better model!"

He stabs the pen his was still holding right into Cathy's desk. Serves her right. Bitch never does her work and keeps pawning it off to the rest of them.

A derisive snort cuts through his anger.

"Oh please," Robin says, "I'm a bandaid on a wound that still bleeds. You Jason,you're the cure. You've always been the cure. I didn't replace you. I can't. I'm Robin now, yes. But Robin wasn't all you were. You were...you were so much more to him. Me? I'm only Robin. You weren't replaced Jason. And you were always loved. You still after five years, the love for you still lingers in the spaces that you all shared." The kid blinked at him. "You're one of a kind Jason Todd."

The anger tries to rail, to rise, fails in the face of the kids' words, in his honest delivery of them. Jason sits back down.

"Shit," he says tiredly, adrenaline draining out of him. "Shit" he rubs at his takes a deep breath and then says. "I...okay. Okay I'll hold you to that for now kid." Tries to take another breath but it sticks in his throat. He swallows hard and then he can breath again.

"I was Robin? Really?"

"Yep," Robin says.

"Huh," Jason says. "You know I thought I was a spy or something. Like Jason Bourne."

"Well you sure got the amnesia down pat," Robin offers. Jason stares at him and then starts laughing.

"Oh my gosh replacement!"

There is a shit-eating grin on the kids face and Jason thinks that maybe this kid isn't so bad, that maybe he's the kind of person Jason would accept being a bandaid for the wound his absence had caused.

When the laughter dies down, he asked, "So what did happen to me?"

Robin goes back to grave stillness. "...You died," he said flatly after a moment."

"Oh," Jason said. His chest feels heavy. There's a stinging across his cheek, the crack of bones in his ear. "That explains the autopsy scar," he said faintly. "I had kinda wondered about that."

Robin gaped at him. "I don't know," he said after a moment, "if to laugh or to cry."

"Eh," said Jason. "I do both."

There was a started puff of laughter and then Robin says, "Let's go do both while we wait for Batman?"

Jason narrows his eyes. "Are you going to take me to a dark secret place and murder me?"

"Nah only a dark, underground, kinda-damp place. We don't kill."

"Are you sure? Because calling someone an 'amnesic troglodyte' pretty much counts as full on murder."

* * *

Jason Todd was in his car. Jason Todd was squeezed into the redbird, hand braced on the safety handle. Jason Todd was alive. Living and breathing and clearly had been dunked in a Lazaraus pit at sometime. And that was possibly the only thing that made any sense right now. And Bruce was going to kill him.

Bruce was going to have a heart attack or a breakdown or fire him or revert to a crisp talking mask or all four at once. Tim was sympathetic but also thought this was fair because he and Dick had known. They had known and hadn't said anything and then clearly hadn't been planning to say anything to the obviously real Jason Todd and Tim might be wanting to punch someone in the teeth. How the hell had he become the emotionally competent one in the manor? Thats Dick and Alfred's job. He and Bruce kinda mumble around and do awkward things to show support and caring.

"So, what's it like?"

"What is what like?" Tim responded broken from his thoughts by Jason's question.

"What's it like jumping around the city in leotards following a giant bat around? "

"Strangely exciting, " Tim said with a quirk of his lips.

Jason snorted."The thrill can't be everything."

"I like helping people," Tim said simply.

"Huh," Jason said. Tim felt like he'd misstepped somewhere.

"Nightwing, uh, Nightwing said you used to say that being Robin gave you magic," He offered.

Jason swallowed, fingers flexed, "Did I?" voice uninterested.

"Yeah," Tim smiled even though he knew Jason was walking on a knife edge. "You looked like magic to me. I couldn't believe any kid could do what you and Nightwing did."

"Obviously that magic didn't last," Jason's voice was hard. "I clearly didn't abracadabra my way out of whatever situation that left me dead."

"Unfortunately we're the weakest class of mage," Tim tells him with mock sympathy, "It's why we rely on our fists so much."

There was a pause and Tim thought that he'd misstepped again, and then "Gosh dammit!" Jason said with feeling. "We only have party tricks don't we?"

Tim grinned widely, "Yep."

"Fricking useful," Jason groused

"Hey it isn't all that bad," Tim retorts. "I got this car."

"It's a damn sweet ride replacement," Jason says appreciatively. "but it's too damn small for my knees."

It's true. Jason's legs are long and he has them cramped up, almost to his chest. It's hilarious and Tim has been trying not to think about it because he might laugh and he's not quite sure how Jason will take anything right now. His eyes still have a green edge, glinting in the low light every now and then, his temper volatile and somewhat warranted.

Tim grins sharp and real. "Get a bike."

"With what money?" Jason groused.

"Oh boy," says Tim and laughs, "Richest man in Gotham remember? If we get through this without Batman going into some kinda happiness coma, you'll definitely get a bike."

"Is he capable of feeling happiness?" Jason asked, voice gone hard.

"Kinda?" Tim says. He pauses and then says with surety, "Yes. But...it was different, before you. Or so I'm told."

There's a beat of silence and then a grunt. Jason has his head turned to look out the window but Tim didn't miss the soft exhale of air, like he'd punched the other boy in the chest with his words.

They don't talk for the next five minutes while Time navigates the backstreets of Gotham and then Jason asks abruptly: "Who killed me?"

Tim glances at him before turning his attention to the road. "Do you, do you really want to talk about that now? I mean, we could wait until you get to the cave. B would be able to tell you more."

Jason shakes his head. His eyes are glassy and glinting. The pit madness, Tim suspects. He doesn't want to say anything, doesn't want to trigger the rage like before in the office.

"Jason," he says carefully. "I don't mean to be insensitive but if you flip out we'll crash."

There's a long pause where Tim genuinely fears for his life and then Jason leans forward and slams his head back onto the head rest.

"Fine!" he snaps. "At least tell me the bastard's dead!"

Tim tenses, curses himself and forces himself to relax. He's too slow though. Jason is sitting up staring at him with raging eyes and Tim automatically hits the brakes, forcing the redbird to come to a screeching halt in the middle of some back alley.

"He's alive!" Jason roars. "The flicking bastard who killed me is still alive?!" The dash creaks from his grip on it. "Damn it to hell Replacement," he sneers in the next second, anger forced a simmer that scares Tim far more than his outbursts. "You're one heck of a liar."

"What do you mean?" Tim asks body coiled, ready to get himself out of the confined space if need be. Jason had been well trained and combined with the pit madness he could spell real trouble for Tim.

Jason laughed. It was haunting, terrifying, sharp and bitter. "All that talk about scouring the world, and me being loved and the bastard who still killed me is running around out there!"

"He's in Arkham," Tim snapped.

"Arkham's a revolving door!" Jason snapped. He hadn't been in Gotham long but even he knew that. "How many times has the bastard who killed me, got out and killed somebody else!"

"He hasn't!" Tim said. "Batman almost killed him, put him in a full body cast when he caught up with him again. I didn't lie to you Jason!"

And Jason was done. Done. It'd been a long five years. He'd died. Somehow come back to life and his murdder was still out there, still living happy, though not free but everyone knew it was only a matter of time before that changed.

Green burned through his veins, his heart hurts, aches in a way he could barely recall but reminded him of blank, staring eyes, a soft voice humming him to sleep, being alone, alone, alone. His mind feels too full, too confused, caught between wanting, and knowing that fairytales were lies. The child-self that had proclaimed that he had magic had never seemed so naive, so far removed from reality. What a fool he'd been.

"Tell, me," he grounds out. "Tell me who killed me! I damn well deserve to know replacement and your precious Batman is only gonna try to soften it. You say you didn't lie to me? Prove it. Tell me the truth replacement and don't you dare try not to give it to me straight!"

His replacement, the kid that had come along, better that Jason surely, because he definitely hadn't died on the job, straightened up and then deliberately dropped the tension from his shoulders, the rest of his body. After a moment he reached up and flipped the white lenses in his mask open, leaving Jason to stare into sharp blue eyes that fixed onto his unerringly. It unnerved him a little, to see the cutting intelligence behind the easy-going boy he'd been interacting with for the entire evening but he didn't let it distract him. He took the offering as it was meant and nodded to the Replacement.

"It was the Joker," Robin told him. "We don't actually know all the details of what happened at the end but it was him."

Jason stilled, mouth going dry. He'd heard horror stories about the Joker's runs in Gotham. Scratch that. Everytime Joker appeared it was like a full on tv series of terror with twenty-six episodes each season and an ever-running renewal each year with prime-time coverage. It was like one of the shows where miles of extras died, only nobody was actually an extra but your favourite character.

The Joker filled graveyards like it was his life's goal. He killed on a whim. He planned with alarming precision, murdered chaotically and found his kicks with games so vividly insane it turned your stomach, made your mind feel like it would break before you ever comprehended them.

The Joker. Gotham's worse.

The laughter comes out of nowhere. It's everywhere, gleefully, high pitched and so filled with joy over his pain. Jason feels the pain. Feels his ribs cracking under the assault, feels his lung punctured, splinters of bone burying themselves into tissue. The next blow shatters his cheekbone, distending his face. His eyeball feels weird, pressured by the shifting bones. A joyous croon, a question he can't hear even as his fingers are working, twisting, trying to get the knots loose. The next blow lands on his upper arm, numbing it, but not breaking it yet, not yet. Jason can barely think, he's down to one hand now but he keeps working, keeps trying to get those knots off, has to even if he knows that B. will be here soon, will come bursting through the door like he always did, dramatic and furious. The metal descends, a raucous laugh that tears at his mind's sanity, and then the pain bursts through his head hot and sharp and Jason screams.

"Jason!"

The yell isn't actually that loud but it's furious in another way, frantic and alarmed. It's worried for him and that's probably the only reason it makes it through. Jason comes back to awareness to find himself face to face with the replacement. He has Replacement pressed against the car door, his palm pressed to his sternum, digging in, causing Replacement's bones to creak alarmingly. His throat is sore, eyes wide,wet.

"Jason," Robin says again, voice wheezed out and Jason releases that he's still digging his palm into the kid, intent on breaking bone. He pulls back his hand and scrambles back, falls into his seat. Robin slumps against the door breathing hard.

Jason is breathing equally hard, shaking helplessly with some combination of rage and fear and pain.

"He killed me," he manages to gasp out. "He killed me."

Movement and then Robin, still breathing hard, tentatively rests a gloved hard on his forearm. "I'm sorry, Jason." And the blue eyes are telling the truth, pain but not pity filling them.

Jason shakes for a few more minutes and then rasps out. "Do you know you don't have any self-preservation instincts?"

Robin laughs, high and hysterical. "It's been mentioned."

* * *

They're out of Gotham proper heading into the more residential districts when Jason speaks again. "I...I know you said you don't kill but ...why? Isn't...isn't this enough? The final straw? He killed me and ...and…"

Robin glances at him. The lenses are back down, leaving him to try to read the kid's blank white gaze.

"When I met Batman," Robin says, "He was spiraling. It was soon after you'd died and he was coming back from every fight injured. He was beating criminals way worse than he ever had. They barely ever went straight to cells. Everyone of them had to take a trip straight to the hospital. But Batman was taking hard blows too, and he wasn't letting himself heal. I had known, even then who he was, so I went to Nightwing and tried to get him to come back, to be Robin, because Batman clearly couldn't survive without a Robin, without someone to pull him back. Nightwing disagreed, but he did come to help. But what I'm trying to say here is, is that I think he wanted to die without you. He doesn't kill but I think it was a last straw. Only I don't think he blamed the Joker." He raises a hand when Jason opens his mouth. Jason snapps his jaw closed and after a moment Robin continues. "Yeah I mean he did blame him and he does. Who wouldn't? But the person he blames the most? That person is himself. That's who he was trying to destroy, who he was trying to kill. It was a last straw Jason but he was going to kill himself, because he failed you. Because to him, he'd killed you. He'd lost you. He was to blame and he should die. The biggest villain in your death was him."

Jason ...doesn't know what to feel, how to feel. Replacement hasn't let his emotions cloud his little narrative at all but Jason can read the underlying tension in his body, see the weight of the history in the way his hands clenched the wheel, the way his shoulders hunch forward like he's trying to protect the big, black bat, from all the way out here. He can read the backstory clear enough to know things had been bad in the aftermath of his death, bad enough for the freaking Batman to go suicidal.

He...doesn't know how to react to this. It's hard, suddenly to go from having no one who knows you to finding out that there are people who will literally want to die if you left, people who loved you so much their hearts broke absolutely when you left. It's...like a dream or a myth, something impossible to believe in, like magic.

"Being Robin gives me magic!"

Maybe his child-self hadn't been so naive after all.

He swallows hard. The green edges still tinting the edges of his vision are enveloped by a soft black; a black that isn't empty, that's filled with warmth and love, soft mornings filled with the scent of pancakes, cool nights wrapped in heavy kevlar, a heavy hand on his shoulder, squeezing out the words 'well done', a deep voice carefully enunciating each word while Jason listens and listens, caught up in the story, caught up in the fact that someone would actually read to him.

It's too much.

Jason craves it like he craves air.

He swallows again. Leans his head back and closes his eyes.

"I don't…" he starts.

"You don't have to," Robin says simply. And Jason chooses to believe him, to let it go. The rest of the ride passes in silence.

* * *

Bruce stares at the message, reading it again and again.

'I'm bringing Jason to the cave- Robin.'

The first time he'd gotten the message he'd almost called Robin there and then, demand to know what he was thinking. He was in fact in the process of doing so when another message came in.

'Don't be an idiot about this, B- Robin.'

Tim was rarely so direct in his censure, traversing his disagreements in logical circles that tied Bruce into a tidy package, forcing him to agree with the boy. It meant he was serious. And Tim was no idiot. He was also further removed from the situation than Dick and himself had been. Bruce fingers had still hovered over the phone but eventually he'd crammed it in his pocket, turned to Dick, who was still hanging around, still trying to convince him to speak with Jason, and had said,

"Cave. Tim says he's bringing Jason."

Now they were in the cave, awaiting the redbird, both in full costume, because neither had known what Tim had told Jason and neither of them quite as prepared as they ought to be. They'd covered over the case.

Dick was bouncing lightly on the balls of his feet, excited and worried all at shifted from time to time, obviously wanting to move but staying still in some effort to keep himself feeling grounded.

Bruce had no such ability. He was afloat in some mixture of fear and happiness because his boy was coming home but it may well be a trap and not his Jay-lad at all. And even if it was him, he didn't remember him and he would no doubt hate him for getting him killed or hurt or whatever the hell had happened to him. Altogether neither he nor Dick were truly prepared when the redbird screeched him way into the cave and came to stop in it's designated bay.

Tim was out first, Robin's light step and obviously uninjured person easing something hard in Bruce's chest that he hadn't even known was there and then the next door opened and the person stepped out.

Dave Doe to W.E.'s files, but he was Jason Todd to him and always would be. Bruce felt no better than the first time he'd seen him in the copier room, felt his words slide away from him and he was pretty sure if it was him alone they entire exchange would have gone badly but he wasn't alone. Dick bounced forward, grinning.

"Hey babybird, see you brought back a passenger!"

Said passenger was still on the other side of the redbird as if keeping the car between him and potential enemies. His eyes had narrowed and the suspicion in the set of his shoulders was hard to miss. But Tim moved towards Dick easily, ducking the hand that tried to ruflle his hair and said, "I brought back a guest, Nightwing." Soft censure, teasing, light.

* * *

Jason hung back taking in the whole situation. The batcave was bigger than he'd expected and he'd expected big. The giant dinosaur and large penny were also unexpected and for some reason relaxed him, made him feel like the place was lived in.

Nightwing was… shorter than Jason had thought from the pictures and he moved with far more grace than Robin had. His smile was easy, brought, made Jason want to relax simply because of it but he moved like a fighter, was built like someone who had trained every inch of himself and that made Jason wary. He didn't know if he'd last in a fight with Nightwing and that wasn't counting the Bat.

"Hey!" the blue and black clad vigilante greeted him, hand stuck out. Jason eyed the hand but made no move to take it. Instead he shifted his gaze to one person in the room who hadn't spoken: Batman.

The terror of Gotham's criminals, the saving grace to many of her innocents, the playboy Prince of Gotham during the day.

If Jason hadn't known, he would have never guessed that Bruce Wayne and Batman were the same person. He stood differently, reacted differently, wore a whole different air about him.

After a long moment Batman spoke. "Jason."

The gravelly voice shocked him a little. It was hard and harsh and sparked something so warm in his chest he felt like he couldn't breathe for a moment. "Batman," he replied. Out of his peripheral vision, he noted Nightwing moving away, giving their conversation space.

There was another long pause and then, "I'm glad you're here."

Jason felt the anger rise, the green flare and pushed it all down.

"You know if you get any more awkward you're gonna be shifting from foot to foot and I don't need a lindy hopping batman in my nightmares."

He saw Batman flinch imperceptibly at the word nightmares before the rest of the statement caught up to him and he blinked.

Meanwhile Nightwing had snorted with laughter, bringing one gloved hand up to cover his mouth before giving up and laughing entirely. Even Robin had his lips pressed together to contain his smile.

"Noted," Batman said still somehow managing to sound like a constipated furry in a bat costume.

"You don't waste syllables do you," Jason said in lieu of anything else to say. What do you say here? What do you ask? How do you interact with your adopted father who apparently is a vigilante and apparently went suicidal when you died? Is there anything to say? Maybe that's why Batman is sticking to small syllables.

"He has a finite number per year," Nightwing answers, "and if he uses them up he can't interrogate criminals." The black and blue clad hero is smirking and continues to do so even as Batman turns a hard blank-eyed gaze to him.

Robin in the meantime has failed to suppress his quiet laughter and chooses to shoot his grapple gun and escape to a catwalk above their heads.

Jason suddenly, quite rationally, he thinks, wants a grapple gun too to escape from this conversation.

"Where have you been?" Oh look the Batman speaks. And, Jason thinks, he's asked the entirely wrong question. Nightwing groans which Jason takes to means he too thinks that Batman is awful.

"Oh I'm quite fine, thanks for asking," Jason says sarcastically, "I died a little bit but I bounced back from that, so we're all good. Got a few scars on the way but what's a few more? Oh and I've lost my memory but hey you've found me so everything is now hunky dory!"

Nightwing winced. Batman has no change of expression save the tiniest twitch of a muscle in his jaw. Jason wants to punch him, wants to pry some expression, some movement out of him, find some way to prove what Replacement had said, wants to bury himself in warm, large arms and the scent of kevlar and aftershave and safe, safe, safe.

"So you did die," the words are unemotional, the half-trembling quirk of the bat's mouth is the only thing that keeps Jason from diving at him whether or not it was advisable.

Nightwing groans again but he's moving forward almost instinctively, half reaching for Jason. Jason stumbles back and Nightwing stops.

"Yes," he grates. "Yes I did die!" There's dirt in his mouth, a sharp, wheezing heaviness on his chest. Pain in shocks down his fingers. His vision kaleidoscopes between green and terrifying black. Jason himself swings between anger and terror.

"Jay," the voice is soft, agonised, desperate to help. It feels like chocolate melting against his skin, warm blankets smelling of familiar detergent. The cadence thrums against his skin, remnants of long, lazy days hiding under bedsheet tents with cookies and flashlights and favourite books.

Jason wants to crumble.

Then there's a hand at his back, another cupping his face and Jason swings on instinct, gets in a good shot that still hurts like shit, but then his hand is gently caught and tossed to the side a little, not held, not pinned down, free to take another shot if he wants, and Jason is enveloped in a hug. The batsuit is hard, it's modern armour, compacted and tailored to fit the man beneath it and it's not shiny but it sure as hell does the same job. The edge of cowl presses sharply into his forehead to the point that Jason knows it'll leave a line on his skin. But the hug is warm and familiar and the word 'dad' nearly forces itself up his throat in response. And though the arms around him shift like they're not sure how to hold his body, they do know how to hold him. And for a minute, a second, forever, Jason is safe, safe, safe.

He doesn't know how long they stand there. He only knows that the arms around him stay until he can breathe, breathe without feeling like he's dying, breathe without feeling an agonising burn of suffocation, breathe like he's finally getting his first breath of fresh air in five years.

Dad.

The word flutters in his throat, beats against his closed lips, knocks frantically against his heart. Not the bat, not Bruce. Dad.

The thought is frightening. The thought is more comforting than he'd ever imagined.

Still.

Still.

Green haze.

Red rage.

Long, lost, lonely days.

Jason steps back, steps out of the Bats arms and takes a moment to steady himself.

When he feels like he's gained some modicum of equilibrium he looks back at the Batman. Only it isn't the batman now. No the cowl is down, and it's Bruce Wayne looking back at him. But it isn't a Bruce Wayne he knows, isn't the Bruce Wayne he sees on the news and magazines. This, this is the man beneath the suit, the man beneath the facade, the man who terrifies criminals with his mind as much as his fists. And yet, this, this is Bruce Wayne that Jason knows, is marked somewhere in his hind brain, too starkly for even death to wipe it out.

This man with the sharp, calculating eyes and the stance of a fighter, the aura of someone who is confident in everything he does, who owns the room simply by breathing. This man is his dad.

Jason knows.

He's not sure he likes it.

Nightwing breaks the tension, stage-whispering, "Yay, you figured out the first lesson Littlewing, hugs are a good way to disarm him."

Batman twitches, barely noticeable but before Jason can really figure out what that signifies, Robin responds.

"But a good way to get yourself thrown."

"I don't get thrown," Nightwing says.

"Not everyone is freaking Nightwing, Dick." Jason can hear Robin's eyes rolling. "Besides," the tiny vigilante continues. "My hugs are bony, I don't think they work as well."

Batman has a slightly pained expression on his face and the normality, the humanness makes Jason relax, makes him want to laugh.

"This is not what I imagined when 'dangerous vigilante who stalks the night' came up," Jason says.

"It's a work in progress," Nightwing, wait the kid called him Dick, (of course, of course it was Bruce Wayne's ward Dick Grayson) assures him. "I even got him to not look constipated when I said a pun."

"But it's slow going," Robin adds from above them.

Batman, Bruce, looks like he wants to sigh but doesn't want to give them the satisfaction. Instead he squares his shoulders and really, wasn't he big enough before? And says, "Jay, tell me what you know. Tell me what happened."

At Nightwing's sound of protest and the way Jason stiffened, he added, "Tell me whatever you can manage to say."

"And if I can't say anything?" Jason demands because he's terrified of delving into the blackness, doesn't want to stir the green in his mind.

There was a pause and then Bruce says, "Then I'll wait."

Jason knows, somehow, that it is a great concession on his part. This is further confirmed by the pleased look Nightwing gives the man.

"Okay," he says slowly, "Okay." He, he needs some distance. Needs time to think, to breathe.

He turns walks away for a bit, hands on his hips, taking deep breaths.

There is the softest sound from behind him and then Robin is ducking into his line of sight. He'd evidently left the catwalk.

"Are you okay?" he asked, brow creased above the mask.

"I don't know," Jason says, the honest answer flying out of his mouth before he can reconsider. He twists his face and then turn to Batman, to Bruce.

"I don't remember much," he announces, "And what I do…. it's not clear. But I died and I woke up and then there was green and the cold and the monks found me and then I ended up here. That's the short version. I can't…." he chokes trying to continue. Panic and air vie for space in his throat. Robin moves forward, finches back when Jason stiffens and jumps, already on his guard.

"Hey," the voice is warm, and then Nightwing is at his back, close enough for Jason to feel the heat of him but still not touching him.

"Hey, you're safe now. You're okay. You don't need to say anything else. You never need to say anything else."

Jason gasped, sobbed really, because the voice was warm, because the voice conjured up feelings of reluctant admiration, and stubborn affection. And anger and relief and loyalty and all the things that he knew, somehow, that brothers inspired in each other.

Hearing Nightwing's voice like this, not simply friendly and open, but revealed, intimate in a way that he had hidden so effortlessly that Jason hadn't known he'd done it, it sparked a reminder. It sparked a hole in his chest he hadn't realised was there. Brother. He'd missed his brother too. Been lonely in a way he hadn't understood.

When Nightwing's arms finally wrapped around him, he turned and buried himself in the hug and wept.

* * *

Bruce is frozen. He is frozen and angry, his anger so hot he's surprised he hasn't gone nuclear before. Green. The Lazarus pit. Jason was dunked in the Lazarus pit.

"Bruce," and suddenly Tim is there, gloved hand on his gauntlet, holding him back. "Bruce don't."

"He," Bruce grinds out watching Jason sob into Dicks shoulder. "If what he said was true, he woke up first ( somehow, somehow, somehow ) and then they stole him. They found him and they took him from me and they threw him in a Lazarus pit." Bruce's voice is the calm, dark edge of Gotham's blackest night. It is the voice that precludes bones breaking and full-body casts. It is the voice that silences Gotham's evil for a week, leaves them cowering from the shadows they usually call home.

But Tim is Robin. He revels in Batman's darkness, he's the spotlight that cuts through it with ease. He is not cowed.

"Don't," he said again. "They took him but they lost him. He found his way back and you found him. You have him. They lost. You won. Don't throw this away. Running after Ra's Al Ghul isn't the smart thing to do in this situation."

But Bruce doesn't care. Because they took his son. His precious, smart, amazing little boy who must have gone through hell. And they took him and carried him away from him. Away from his father and his home and his brother. They'd sunk him into the terrible waters, no doubt layering his trauma and Jason, Jason had lost his memories. Most of all, they'd lost time with each other. And Bruce cannot forgive this.

He pulls his arm from Robin. Pulls the cowl back up and steps away towards the Batplane.

Robin follows him, but he doesn't try to stop him again. Instead he says,

"Don't leave him now. Not when he needs you the most. Not again."

Bruce freezes. The words conjure visions of explosive heat and a lifeless body, too small, too small not to be breathing. They conjure up guilt, the horror of being too late, of finding out exactly what each minute that he'd been too late had cost his son, from the autopsy.

And when he finally turns, can finally breathe again, Robin's face is the picture of contrition but there's also steel in his look. He's sorry. But he's not sorry that he stopped him.

Bruce should be angry perhaps. But his heart is still reeling. And he can't bring himself to argue with Tim. He knows that not all monsters are corporeal things. Bruce himself knows all too well how big a monster loneliness can be.

He pinches his forehead and says, "Fine."

"I'm sorry," Tim says. His eyes are glittering. Bruce swallows hard, says nothing but steps forward and wraps the boys in his arms.

"You've nothing to be sorry for. You were are right. And I wouldn't have stopped any other way."

Bruce doesn't think of it as much as he should, because he tries, tries not to get wrapped up in this little boy's life more than he should, he tries and fails not to miss him, to worry, to wish that he could come home and this brilliant, little boy would be waiting there doing his homework in the kitchen like the other two before him. Bruce tries not to think about it but he cannot forget exactly how much the monster of loneliness has plagued his Robin.

"Bruce," Tim murmurs, unsure and little longing, hesitant to take the comfort offered. It breaks Bruce's heart. He simply squeezes a little tighter and then releases Tim partially, choosing to keep and arm draped over his shoulders.

He turns to watch Jason, whose head is still buried in Dicks shoulder but he isn't sobbing anymore, simply seeming to soak up the comfort and contact.

* * *

When the sobs finally stop coming, Jason kinda simply rests on Nightwing's shoulder trying to pull himself back together. It takes him too long to realise that he was still propped up on Nightwing, and really what the hell was wrong with him?

Having a minor sobbing breakdown was not in the cards for his plans today. Having that breakdown on his kinda-sorta-maybe brother? That had never, ever been in the cards and Jason made a mental note to stack the deck so that it never, ever happened, ever again.

He pulls away and scrubbs his hands over his face quickly, trying to act like his eyes weren't puffy and his nose still wanted tor run. Or alternatively like he cried on people all the time and wasn't in the least bit ashamed. One of them had to work out from him right?

He looked around and caught sight of Batman. Oh no. He had a minor breakdown in front of Batman. Well, Jason thought stubbornly in an effort to gain back some of his own self-respect, he had a minor breakdown in front of me at W. E., we're even.

Batman didn't seem to mind that he'd suddenly started crying though. He had one arm slung across Replacement's shoulders and something in Jason ached at the casual way they stood together, the ease at which affection flowed between them. But he had other things to worry about.

"So what now?" he said. "it's not like I can simply appear back from the dead and everything. Not even Gotham's that wierd ."

"Now you've jinxed us," Robin said, grinning crookedly.

"I can't jinx us 'cause it already happened," Jason shot back.

Robin shrugged, moving Bruce's arm. "Touché."

"Why don't we worry about that later?" Dick said, finally peeling off his mask. "Jason, there's someone who really ought to see you again."

Jason tensed. He couldn't help it.

"Who?"

It was Batman who answered though. "Alfred," he said, "my butler"

"Your butler?" Jason was confused.

"Your grandfather," Robin said. "basically."

"My…" Jason trailed off as he made the connections. He looked at Bruce. "Oh."

"You two got along very well," Bruce said. "We haven't told him yet… We were waiting to make sure. But if you have no objections ..."

"I…." Jason paused. "No, I don't mind."

Bruce nodded and Jason watched as he hit the intercom and spoke into it.

A few moments later, the door atop the sators opened and a tall, severe, figure came down. It was an old man, with thinning black hair, dressed in a butler's uniform. He didn't notice Jason at first, instead focusing on Bruce.

"Master Bruce," he began.

"Al," Bruce cut him off, moving forward. "There's something you need to see. And I assure you that it is real."

The old man's brow creased and he opened his mouth to speak when he caught sight of Jason hovering next to Dick.

His jaw dropped and he said faintly. "Good grief…." Bruce reached out a hand and gripped his arm which turned out to be a good thing as the old man stumbled a bit and then leaned on Bruce.

"Master Bruce," he said weakly.

"It's okay Al." Batman's voice was warm and soft and fond and Jason, Jason could see the relationship simply by that tone.

"Is it…?"

"It's him," Bruce confirmed. "DNA and dental match, and he has memories."

"Hey where'd you get DNA from?" Jason said sharply.

"Your coffee cup," Nightwing says shrugging. "I dug it out of the bin."

Jason blinks, thinks about getting mad, feels too damn exhausted at this rate and also the old man is looking like he's this close to actually having a coronary. He sighs.

"Alfred is it?" he says instead.

The butler blinks at him. Before he can ask Jason tells him.

"Lost a good chunk of my memory. I'm only getting bits and pieces back. Heard you're the grandpa. How was raising the world's finest detective with a bat kink?"

The butler blinks again and then straightens.

"As rewarding and as frustrating as helping to raise you Master Jason," he replied primly. "Though he never did share your love or nack for the kitchen and I fear he only managed to instill manners in you and completely bypassed his own personage."

"Al," Bruce says pained but Jason is in awe. He thinks he's in love. It's only a few sentences but he can totally tell who's really in charge here. It's totally possible to adopt another adult as your grandparent right? If it isn't Jason will find a way.

"Is there anyway to bribe you?" Jason asks not bothering to hide his awe. "How do we stay in your good graces?"

Robin and Nightwing giggle and Batman sighs and looks resigned.

Alfred on the other hand says, "It is not possible to bribe me Master Jason. And as for staying in my good graces, you'd have to be in it for once and I hardly doubt that these," here his gaze swept over the three costumed vigilantes, "will ever reach such heights as they insist on bedecking themselves with dramatic spandex and fighting criminals. However," and here his eyes softened, sparkling gently, "As you have granted me a miracle today Master Jason, I do believe it will be a long time until you are ever out of my good graces. If it is ever possible at all."

While Jason stares at him, jaw hanging opening, throat too tight to say anything, Alfred steps forward and wraps him in a gentle embrace.

Jason's arms betray him, wrapping themselves around Alfred like it's easy, and the scent of flour and yeast, and lemon-scented cleaners fits into the spaces left behind from Bruce's aftershave and kevlar and Dick's sandalwood and musk to form the final picture of home.

It's overwhelming and not enough.

Too soon the hug comes to and end and Alfred steps back, straightening his clothes like he's settling his composure and said,

"Did you have dinner?"

"Uh no?" Jason says, thrown a bit. On cue, his stomach growls.

Alfred throws the rest of them a look that utterly chastise them for letting a guest go hungry and says, "If you follow me Master Jason, I will set out dinner. Master Bruce, master Dick and Master Tim, do endeavour to leave your costumes below when you come up."

With that the butler primly sweeps up the stairs and is gone.

"Woah," Jason says into the silence. "I wanna be him when I grow up."

"It's an impossible dream," Dick sighs, "But we can still try." He grins suddenly, wide and real and Jason feels the soft warmth of 'brother' bloom in his stomach. "Come on Littlewing," Dick says, "We don't disobey Alfred!"

"In that case," Jason says dryly, "you should get out of that."

Dick looks down at himself and sighs. "Come on Babybird," he calls to Robin. 'Tim', Jason thinks , 'that's his name.'

Robin slouches but comes, grumbling under his breath about having to change back for patrol later. They both head off to what must be a change area leaving Jason and Bruce alone.

"You don't have to stay for dinner," Bruce says slowly, after a moment, "If, if it's too much right now, you can say no. Alfred would understand."

Jason hears the words he doesn't say - I would understand. It helps quell the initial anger, the initial thought that Bruce is trying to get rid of him, that he doesn't really care after all.

"I," he pauses, starts again, "Robin said that you… That it was the Joker. He said you almost killed him."

Bruce's face hardens and it suddenly doesn't matter that he isn't wearing the cowl right now.

"It was him… And I should have, maybe but it would end what Batman stands for, sours all the good that we'd done. I thought…. I thought that you wouldn't want that. You loved Robin. You loved helping. You felt it, with every fibre of your being. You believed in what we did."

It's good. But it isn't what Jason wants to hear. He doesn't know what he wants to hear. He runs at his face and then turns away, heads up the stairs. Behind him, Bruce says nothing but Jason can feel his heartbreak.

Being Robin gives me magic!

Being Jason Todd though, had made him a son. He wonders, as he fridges up the stairs if there was really any way to hide that he was related to the man behind him. And if there was any way to fix what was shattered between them.

* * *

Dinner was the best thing he'd ever eaten. Which made it a pity that it was paired with what was possibly the most awkward conversation since humanity started grunting to communicate.

Once striped of their costumes and masks, the three vigilantes became taciturn. Well Dick didn't, instead managing to keep up a stream of chatter about the most inappropriate or unrelatable topics to the point that Jason was impressed that someone could be so offbeat for so long. Bruce and Tim however pretty much shut up and did the one syllable at a time, thing. Also good grief did Robin weight anything at all? Was he anything more than a ghost, floating around dealing judgment to evil doers with mystical abilities and sharp blue eyes? Because crap, the kid was tiny. He'd been tiny in the robin gear. He was impossibly smaller without it. What the hell was Batman thinking? A breeze could blow the kid over.

It got him mad then. Mad to think that Batman would let another one of them out there. But he remembers himself throwing Robin, remembers the graceful way the kid moves. He remembers all the news footage he's seen of their fights when he'd first come to Gotham. For all that the kid is literally half of a split hair, he can hold his own.

The green fades and then the only thing green in his sight is broccoli.

* * *

The end of dinner is a relief. Jason however ought to have known better to relax because as soon as he does, Alfred asks if he will stay the night or return to his own home.

He knows, knows it isn't more than it sounds but his heartbeat still spikes and his mind won't listen to logic, won't shut up between screaming, home, home, home and pain, loss, pain, loss.

He bolts.

Literally runs out the dining room, down the impossibly long hallway, veers into an empty room and scrambles at the window latches. He pushes open the window and goes out and up, fingers finding handholds almost on instinct (or memory).

He doesn't know how long he sat on the roof, head in his hands breathing and breathing when Tim clambers up onto the roof and settles next to him.

"I don't know how to do this," Jason breathes. "I don't know if I want to."

"No one's forcing you to do anything that you don't want to Jason," Tim says gently. "if what you need is to walk away, from everything, from us, then you do that. All anyone here wants, is what's best for you."

"I don't…"

Leaving here, makes his chest feel like it's cracking open, bleeding raw and desperate, despite him only spending a few hours in the place and with the company. But staying…. Thinking about staying makes his chest feel tight, heavy, strangled with unresolved issues that he can't even pin down to solve.

"I don't know," he says. "I don't know shit."

He swallows hard. Says, "Why'd he take you? Why'd he take another one? After I died? I know you said he needed a Robin but why he still take you? He should have said no!"

"He did," Tim said easily. "So I asked again and he said no. And I asked and he said no. And I asked and he said no. And then I was like whelp, I'm Robin now and you can't do shit. Here have a dose of caution."

"What?" Jason is half-startled, half-laughing.

"Well it wasn't exactly like that," Tim says and his smile is a little private as he no doubt recalls fond memories, "But close enough. He didn't want a Robin. I didn't want him to die" Tim hesitates a little and then adds very quietly, "I think I loved him even then, even before I really knew him, before I really knew that I did."

Jason sighs. Leans back on his arms on the roof. Looks away at the stars.

"I can't do this," he says quietly, "I'm not the boy they lost. I'm not even the man that he would have grown into. This…This whole thing feels like a stupid cartoon where everything turns out right, like someone waves a magic wands and somehow fixes everything but it didn't. It only kinda fixed things." He takes a deep breath, carefully doesn't look at Tim.

"You say I'm the cure but… I'm not. The kid they lost was the cure. I'm the reason for the whole other bandaid. I'm not magic. I don't feel like magic. I'm no magic wand. "

"That's cause you passed the magic onto me," Tim says, seriously, "for me to hold on to until you got back."

"But I can't take it back," Jason snarls, "I'm not that boy. Robin can't give me magic. I'm no mage. The only thing I can summon is myself. Whoever that is these days."

"I think," Tim says softly, "That yourself, whoever that is, whoever you want to be, that's is all the world needs you to summon. It's all you need to summon. We don't need Robin, the world never has. It only ever needed the boys behind the mask. Cause the mask? It's empty without eyes behind it, without heart behind it. "

* * *

Bruce finds Jason in his room. Not the room Alfred had set up for him, but his old room. The one he'd had as a child, the one that had remained the same, like it was waiting for him to come back and resume life where he'd left it.

Jason had walked to it on instinct alone, threading his way through the halls with familiarity.

"It was my fault," Bruce speaks into the silence, the darkness. And it was Bruce, not Batman. "Every day, every day, I knew it was my fault. I shouldn't have left you. I shouldn't have let you be Robin. I should have let you be Jason and Jason only. Kept you safe and told you I loved you everyday like every parent who wasn't a complete failure." His deep voice seizes. He takes a breath. " I needed…. No, I wanted a partner and friend so much, I put you in danger and that… that can't ever be acceptable. "

"Why Tim then?" Jason asks. He still isn't looked at him.

"Because Tim would be out there no matter what I did," Bruce said heavily. "He would be out there with no armour or weapons. He would follow me to every dark pit I entered without a thought for his life. And I cannot get him to leave. I can't get him to hate me. I can't push him away because that would kill him as sure as a bullet to his head. Tim is perhaps the one person in all the world who has out-stubborned me. So I put him armour and watch his back and hopes everyday that he comes back home. "

" You love him, " Jason says.

"... Yes. "

" You love me? "

" That was never in question Jay-lad." and his voice is warmth, soft, layers of liquid honey and movie nights and an arm thrown over his shoulders, small real smiles given to him.

"I don't," Jason hunches his shoulders, tries to verbalise the knot inside him. "I don't know what I want from you," he spits out. "There's this thing…. inside… And I'm so angry and I don't know what I want from you! I don't know how to fix this!" He's yelling and there's tears in his eyes because apparently he isn't done sobbing for today and his voice is hoarse and green throbs in the back of his mind, sticks in his chest and claws its way up and up and up.

"I'm sorry."

The words cut through his turmoil, seizing the green in its path.

"I'm sorry I didn't treat you the way I ought to have. I'm sorry I left you in Ethiopia. I'm sorry I wasn't there to save you. I'm sorry I never visited your grave after the funeral. I'm sorry, I didn't find you before this. I'm sorry I took so long to believe that it was you. I'm sorry I didn't bring you home sooner. I am so very sorry Jason Todd. I'm so sorry son. "

Jason doesn't know when he moves, he doesn't know when the knot dissolves. All he is aware off is being buried in Bruce's arms, sobbing," Dad! Dad! Dad! " like he can't get enough of the word, like he can't get enough of this feeling of being free, of being home, of being loved, so purely and richly, he will always, always being awe of it.

"Dad," he says again, roughly.

"I have you," Bruce is whispering back and he's crying too, silent tears dripping into Jason's wild curls. "I have you son."

And there in the bedroom of a boy that was lost, Jason Todd comes home.

* * *

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https: pin/614248836655227629/ - That's the link with the post that inspired this fic. Simply remove the spaces.


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